River of Sinners
by X.P. Gam3r
Summary: A lost knight meets up with Charold, a lone man sitting beside the River Twygz, who has more to him than meets the eye...


Thin, scrawny trees leaned and bowed, constantly under attack by the somber breeze, their bark appearing as though it had been mauled by a vicious bear. Not a singular individual out of the hundreds of malnourished trees appeared any different than the one it depressingly stood beside. Shrivelled leaves that had to have been dead for months encircled the bases of the trees, rotting away atop dried soil. A few leaves surprisingly remained clinging to the trees, their grip barely strong enough to prevent their collapse at the wind's wish. This unlikely forest fell silent as dusk nestled its way in, casting an ugly brown aura over the area. The warm colors associated with the setting sun simply transformed the mass of dead trees into a sad, ugly hellscape.

Only one sound emitted from within the wasteland, and it was persisting. The sound of water, running calmly, or rather, dejectedly, through a river. In a twisting path that cut the forest in half, a haunting river, flooded with dark purple water, ran in an infinitely boring routine. The water's surface bobbed and waved slightly as it moved downstream. Strange ripples occasionally disrupted the water's unsettling monotony. Aside from that, the strangely colored body of liquid shared the same quality of dullness as the deceased sea of trees it flowed through.

On the riverside, where the violet water brushed against the mixture of rock and soil and separated the land, a small rowboat sat, sparks of flame blowing past it with the wind, detaching from their host, a small, insignificant fire, which was accompanied by a lonely man sitting on a log, his head hung low. The man's upper face was unrecognizable. Its features were concealed under a torn straw hat, and the parts of his face that remained uncovered, such as his cracked lips and small, mangled beard, were hard to make out in the dimming light. The man, in his poorly knit, baggy clothes, fiddled with a quarter in his right hand, with his left resting on his knee.

A presence in the forest drew the man's attention. He lifted his head only slightly at the sound of footsteps and the crunching of leaves long dead. A wandering man, garbed in the battered armor of a knight and with a shield slung across his back, approached the riverside fire. A large scar rested on the armor's breastplate. The traveller's face distraught with confusion, he confronted the lone man watching over his fire.

"Welcome, sir," the man said in a sinister voice, attentive of the quarter dancing on his fingers.

"Who the hell are you," the knight sharply demanded. His jaw was defined, and lined with small, jagged hairs.

"Oh, just a wandering soul, you could say." The man sunk his head even lower and made a welcoming gesture with his hat.

The knight showed frustration at this faulty answer. Grating his teeth, he responded, "I don't suppose you could take me on a ride across the river with that thing." He lifted his blood soaked hand and pointed at the miserable row boat resting on the river's edge.

"Oh, that old thing? Sure," the sketchy man replied, ignoring the dripping liquid coating the man's hand. "Got a quarter?"

"You kiddin' me? I'm a damned knight! We don't take valuables into battle."

The man trapped the coin in his emaciated fist and chuckled roughly. "Well, isn't that just a shame?" He sat, his spine stiff and unmoving, as he contemplated. "I suppose…"

"Suppose what?" The knight's temper rose as his patience grew thinner than the man's brittle, starved arms.

"I suppose," the man repeated, "I could make do with an acception. That shield slung across your back."

"You're out of your mind!" The knight began lumbering towards the river, agitated and exhausted.

"If you're planning on doing what I can only assume you are, I'd say it's actually quite the contrary," the old man snickered.

"And what the hell do you mean by that?"

"Oh, surely your intent isn't to swim across that river on your own, is it?" The man spoke with a smug expression. He had begun flipping the quarter in the air, and still remained focused more on this activity than the conversation at hand.

"If my choices are that or give up my shield to an old beggar like you, 'course it is!"

The shaded man caught the quarter between his thumb and index finger, examined its now dull but once brilliant surface, and tossed it into a brown sack beside him, which was almost overflowing with thousands of identical coins. The knight's eyes squinted in suspicion. He noticed, scattered around the stuffed sack lying on the ground, were many strange objects that seemed completely out of place. A fancy, engraved bow rested against a log covered with fancy cloths, old weapons, jewelry, and just about anything else with value.

"You cheap bastard!" The knight scolded the hoarding man after observing his stash.

"I don't believe someone in a position such as your own should be speaking to the ferryman with such a cruel tongue, don't you think?" The man's face was overwhelmed with a massive grin.

"You're a filthy con," the knight scoffed, defeated. He slowly reached his right arm behind his back to grab the shield. The scratched reflection of a dirty, scarred face looked back at the knight from the shield's imperfect surface. The knight gave his reflection a scornful look, and tossed the shield at the stash of items on the log.

"I had a hunch you'd be giving that old thing up," the ferryman said, his hands now stuffed into the pockets woven into his dirty, ripped shirt. "Now," he stood up slowly, his head still pointing down, "We're off. I'm sure I'm correct in assuming you'd like to spend as little time here as possible, yes?"

"I'm sick of your pointless bantering. Just take me across the river." The knight crossed his arms, his bloody hands coating the armor in a thick red.

"Right this way." The ferryman led the knight to his boat, which looked even less reliable up close. The wooden boards appeared old and rotten, and the boat's ability to stay afloat was questionable, but the knight stepped in with his heavy iron boots as if he didn't have a choice. The ferryman followed after snatching an oar with an unsurprisingly similar appearance to that of the boat itself. He dipped the wooden oar into the deep, purple body, and pushed towards the flow, propelling the shoddy row boat.

Neither being on that boat chose to speak for awhile. The ferryman had no cruel teases for the knight, and therefore, the knight had no defensive rebuttal. They simply moved down the river, which maintained the same slow, boring flow the whole time, other than an occasional ripple or bubbling on the surface.

"Hey you, con artist," the knight called out from the front of the small boat.

"You do realize that even I have a name, don't you?" The ferryman acted offended, but it was clear he was jesting to further annoy the knight.

The knight was peeved, clenching his now dry, crusty red fist. "Then how about you give me yours?"

The ferryman looked into the knight's dead, empty eyes while still hiding his own. "Charold, the Ferryman."

"Alright, Charold. What the hell are all these bubbles in the water?"

"Oh, I suppose knights consider themselves too astute for fair trades," Charold asked. "This is where one would typically expect a name in return, rather than a rudely proclaimed question."

"It's Brent. Now could you answer the question or is there more you'd like to take from me?"

Charold kept rowing through the foggy water, his white teeth glaring as he flashed his signature grin. "The bubbles… They're… the souls of sinners."

"And I guess I'm supposed to believe that?" Brent's teeth glared as well, but not with a grin.

"I'm quite shocked you wouldn't, taking into consideration everything that's most certainly happened to you as of late."

"You got that right! I got swindled by an old troll livin' in the woods. I guess souls in a river isn't too crazy."

"I'm quite certain I must have rowed dozens of them down this river with me, these sinners in the river," Charold took a deep breath of the musty, toxic air as if it was as pure as could be. "I wouldn't be all too surprised if I rowed right across your desperate soul on my next trip."

"I'm not a sinner!" Brent's face tensed up quite a bit. Instead of responding, Charold set his oar down across the boat and reached out to grab hold of the land on the riverside.

"If I may ever so kindly interrupt your objecting, Brent. We've arrived at the end of River Twygz. You may depart from the boat and refrain from ever seeing this old face again."

Brent was as quick to get off the boat as he was to get on. Scanning the new area, he saw the same dying trees and deprived soil that were at the place he departed from, however, shrouded by the black trees yet partially illuminated by the setting sun, a large, devilish palace sat, its entrance unblocked and prepared for the guest.

He turned back to see Charold, already on his way upstream, looking back at him.

"Brent," Charold yelled. The cryptic ferryman bowed to the knight and removed his hat, revealing glowing, orange eyes.

"I wish you all the best at your fateful meeting. I've heard Hades isn't in a particularly friendly mood today." The ferryman laughed and smiled wide, his menacing eyes piercing the knight's soul, and disappeared into the purple fog.


End file.
